SNES Arranged Sountracks

Listening to these CDs made you a hardcore gamer before hardcore gaming was easy.

The Super Nintendo was just as well known for great music as it was for great games. I remember getting unnecessarily pumped from fighting Katana (that jerk in the ring with the swords) in Final Fight, or trying to qualify in a last lap of Top Gear. I can't imagine those games being as good without the music backing them up.

As great as it was, I think composers still felt limited by the console's cartridge based sound processor. Hence, Arranged Soundtracks gave us CD quality alternate takes on our favorite songs - and giving us hardcore gamers a reason to mark out!

These CDs are long out of print and were never really released in the States. A simple google search can put all these gems in your digital collection. As games started coming on discs, the arranged soundtrack has become an unneeded and dying art. Some great and not-so great, what a way to relive the good old days of Game Music.

Super Mario World ArrangedReleased: 2.25.91Composer: Koji Kondo

Super Mario World might have carried the least familiar Mario music, but this CD gave a different take on it. The result was a smooth jazz attack. Most of the tracks are driven by a warm saxophone, with an extremely mellow ambidence. I bet you could put this on in Macy's and have no one complain about it "sounding like a video game".01. Welcome to Mario World.(5:19) 02. Super Mario World.(5:11) 03. Morning of Yoster Island.(4:40) 04. Mario! Stay Alert!.(4:58) 05. Thank You, Mario!.(5:37) 06. Super Mario Bros..(4:23) 07. Shining Coral.(3:07) 08. Go! Go! Raccoon Mario.(5:06) 09. Mario Club Band.(1:28) 10. Peaceful Kinoko-World.(5:32) 11. Good Night, Mario.(1:14) Street Fighter II ~ Sing!! InstrumentalReleased: 12.16.92Composer: Yoko Shimomura, Alph-Lyra (original), Seiji Toda (arranged)

Arguably the greatest music to the greatest fighting game - ever. The arranged version carries everything from hard rock to techno to blues. Even cooler, was Capcom also released a version with lyrics. These songs are just plain HOT, and the lyrics drive the character depth - though I can't imagine why you'd need or want to creep into their psyche :/. The track "Bison's dream" is in English, reflecting the nationality of everyone's favorite generic boxer. That shows great care for their characters. They may have released ten different versions of the same game, but they certainly didn't slouch in the music department.01. towards the dream position [CHUN LI] (Spinning Long Version) (5:12) 02. Crimson Ken ~Burning Blood~ [KEN] (4:25) 03. blanka has come to town!! [BLANKA] (4:04) 04. a thrust of the hand: spirit of japan [E. HONDA] (3:36) 05. lonely wolf [GUILE] (4:31) 06. in faraway india [DHALSIM] (4:22) 07. dread! vacuum man!! [ZANGIEF] (3:19) 08. becoming the storm [RYU] (Tornado Intro Version) (4:49) 09. Bison's Dream [BISON] (4:42) 10. masked narcissist [BALROG] (4:04) 11. tiger legend [SAGAT] (3:05) 12. silent gravestone [VEGA] (3:57)

Mega Man X - ArrangedReleased: 3.9.94Composer: Alph-Lyra

Before many fans felt the franchise got out of hand with all the spinoffs, Mega Man music was all about blues driven rock and metal. The first SNES mega man game was no exception. The turnabout comes on this CD, which is slow jazz fusion like you've probably heard on the weather channel. Its hard for me to even find the original melody in most of the songs. Still, its an interesting listen. I constantly find myself unwinding to Night In The White, Chill Penguin's stage, after a long day at work.01. Prologue - Awakening Road.~OPENING:HIGHWAY STAGE~ (5:48)02. Welcome To Mechanical Forest.~FOREST STAGE~(3:18) 03. Take Back The Tower.~TOWER STAGE~(4:27) 04. Night In The White.~ICEBERG STAGE~(5:41) 05. Scrapping Beat.~FACTORY STAGE~ (4:19)06. Get Through The Dark.~TUNNEL STAGE~(4:29) 07. Spark And Shadow.~POWER PLANT STAGE~(4:54) 08. Again.~UNDERGROUND STAGE~(5:49) 09. Repliroid King.~VS. LAST BOSS STAGE~(3:59) 10. Epilogue - The Transient Silence.~ENDING STAGE~(4:31)

Great article!!! Video game soundtracks are as important to me as the game itself sometimes. Unashamedly, the music of DKC (especially "Aquatic Ambiance") makes me feel like having a good cry sometimes - that's how nostalgic it makes me. The years of the mid-nineties were by far the best of my life, and I'd do almost anything to be able to revisit them. :'{

The one video game soundtrack I actually purchased was Zelda: Ocarina of Time - another classic who's melodies take me back. I just "popped it in" on the Virtual Console last night.

These are very interesting soundtracks you have mentioned even though I never heard of them, I do have two soundtracks and they are Star Fox 64 and Mega Man. Other than that great article! I give it two thumbs up!

Cool article! When I discovered there was a soundtrack to two of my favorite video games, Donkey Kong Country for the SNES and Super Mario 64 for the N64, I was elated! But alas, they are pretty hard to come by nowadays. They must be out of print, and THAT sucks.

If there is a Double Dragon soundtrack somewhere, I'm all over that. There was a lot of rockin' keyboard/MIDI stuff going on during that game.

You know who else is great for instrumental video game style music is Buckethead. He wrote/performed the MMPR theme, Goro vs. Art on the MK movie soundtrack and a lot of his albums are pretty good too.

Some of these soundtracks were great. Mega Man has always had some terrific music and Mega Man X was no exception. Have you ever heard of The Mini-Bosses? They are a cover band who do classic song from video games, usually from The NES. Its good stuff. Thumbs up.